Sing You Home by Ava Hunter

It isn’t grocery day but she’s still leaving. She’s getting out of this house once and for all. Because once was enough.

Jenny’s waited until nine, pretending to sleep the sleep of the dreamless as Roy gave her one last kiss. His meaty fingers brushing disheveled hair from her face while he whispered I love you. Sure he did. He always loved her until he didn’t. Until she found herself with Roy’s hands wrapped around her throat.

But now Roy’s at work. He won’t be back until evening. And freedom’s come calling like a knock in the night and Jenny’s flinging open that door, ready to run into the arms of the other side.

She kicks off the covers and breaks for the closet. She’s boiling up, but not from heat. From nerves. Sweat drips down her brow. Her legs are so gummy she can barely walk. But she does.

She has to.

Hovering in the closet doorway, Jenny unearths a grungy green messenger pack hidden deep behind two thick quilts. Her makeshift go-bag, packed days ago in preparation for her escape. Two plans on her mind. She doesn’t know which direction she’ll take, only that both scare her. But she’s been living scared. Probably for most of her life.

Things didn’t always use to be like this, she thinks, but she doesn’t know why.

Moving to the dresser, Jenny snaps off the tinny radio. Some country song dying a slow death. There, she takes a quick glance around the tiny, lonely cabin where she’s been laid up for the last nine months. Antlers on the wall. A blurry wedding photo of her and Roy. A kitchenette with one flickering fluorescent.

As Jenny’s eyes brush against the bed, her entire body lets loose an angry shudder. She hates that bed. She wants to burn it to the ground, light it on fire and dance on its flames. She spent so much time there after the accident that left her without her memories. When she woke, she knew nothing. She still knows nothing. Except that her name is Jenny Williams, and she was injured in a brutal mugging.

At first, her husband was loving. Kind. For the first three months of her recuperation, she was so sick and Roy was perfect. But overprotective. He never let her lift a finger. He also never let her out of the house. You were mugged, he would say. How can I let you go? How can I lose you again?

She accepted this because she was still healing from the accident, but when she was finally better, when her mind became stronger, she thought it strange she had no friends, no family, no job.

All she had were bad migraines and broken memories.

She still does.

Sometimes when she’s alone, the walls around her peel and crumble. Sometimes, late at night, her dreams resemble a Rorschach test. A man with dark eyes, smoking metal, a song.

It won’t always be like this, Roy said, explaining away her questions. Your ID was stolen. We had friends but they moved. Your parents died in a car crash.You just need time to get healthy.

She almost laughs.

Oh, she’s healthy alright. She’s finally healthy enough not to listen.

Last week, Jenny tried to leave. She walked out of the house onto the front porch and Roy just snapped.

He took her by the throat, dragged her back into the house, and shoved her against the wall, pulling her up until her feet left the floor. A whisper into her ear, The minute you leave me, I will break your fucking neck, sweet Jenny, then he strangled her until she passed out.

It wasn’t the first time it happened, but it was the worst time. And it was Jenny’s lightbulb.

She had to get out.

Breaking from her daydream daze, Jenny snaps into action.

She doesn’t need much. Her wallet’s already in the bag, a small stash of money pinched from her grocery fund. Stashed away where Roy would never find it. Jenny moves quick, frantic. Her fingers fumble with her meager belongings: medication, coins for her bus fare, a small paperback. Her heart threatens to beat itself out of her chest. She can’t help but take furtive glances at the door, worried that any minute her beast of a husband might come in and catch her.

To calm herself, Jenny begins to sing. “Because whatever you do, wherever you go, you’re the only one who sings me home . . .”

That song. She doesn’t know where it came from or what it means, only that it’s her savior, that it’s been on her mind ever since she woke up. A rhythmic mantra keeping her going in her moments of panic. Self-soothing, she supposes. Like a worry stone, only it’s a worry song. Her touchstone when she’s damn near ready to fall apart.

Finished packing, she glances up. When she meets her ashen face in the mirror, when she sees the finger-sized bruises painting her throat, her cheekbone, she swears. She wants to scream at her reflection.

Haunted. You’re haunted. You’re fucking deranged.

Goddamn if she’s going to be kept in the house like some mutt on a leash. Fury rolls through her body, and she takes a breath to compose herself.

Prisoner.

It’s a strange thought. One that scares her and fills her with strength at the same time. A final admission of what these last nine months have been.

Monstrous.

It applies to her husband as well.

Love isn’t this. Whatever it is.

In the mirror, Jenny gives herself a grin that’s braver than she feels. Then she slings the bag across her trembling body and heads for the door. She’s only taken a few steps when she stops and staggers.

Suddenly, Jenny gasps as she’s hit by a wave of vertigo. She’s still unsteady on her feet after all these months. Black spots pulse at the corner of her vision, threatening to take her down. “No,” she moans, gripping dresser’s edge, her knuckles tense and whitening.

The fainting spells don’t happen as often as they used to, but when one hits, it puts her out.

No way. Not here, not now.

If Roy comes home and finds me—

Tears prick her eyes, but she grits her jaw and rallies.

With a shake of her head, she clears the cobwebs from her mind and collects herself, taking small breaths to stave off the pain. She resists the urge to reach into the bag for her migraine meds. They make her sluggish and tired, and she needs her wits about her. Especially today.

Besides, she’s better. She’s felt better for a hell of a long time.

Jenny grimaces at the lie that’s so easily rolled across the caverns of her mind.

She is better.

Jenny puts her hand on the doorknob and twists.

Free, she thinks as she steps out of the house. But she can’t help but hear the nagging words in the back of her mind. No, you aren’t.

Three hours later, Jenny’s in Pensacola. She’s gone to the water. She read about Opal Beach in a travel magazine Roy had brought home. One of the most beautiful beaches in the world, the article proclaimed. Well, Jenny wants to see it for herself.

As she exits the bus, she stops and stares at the turquoise ocean. She inhales the smell of sea and salt. Tilts her face up toward the sun, loving the pulse of warmth on her skin.

She’s fascinated by water, though she’s mystified why. Only the deep tug in her soul tells her it means something. Freedom. The way water goes on forever without end. Maybe she is part water, she is part sea. Restless and wanting. Somewhere, deep in her mind, she remembers walking on water, a bridge of sorts, but she chalks it up to a daydream.

Jenny shivers. The thin cotton slip dress she wears is damp with ocean air. Suddenly self-conscious, she cocoons her cardigan around her body, hoping it covers the bruises on her throat. Then, she crosses the street to a small box diner perched on the cliff overlooking the ocean. Its bright beacon of a neon sign blinks EAT EAT EAT.

Jenny smiles. She’ll do just that.

As she climbs the stairs, she gives a longing look at the water. Just to touch a toe in would be heaven, but hunger wins out. She can feel her stomach grumbling a warning to eat or else. She hasn’t had a decent meal in ages. So, she’ll hit the diner, decide next steps. She’s resisted making too many plans for fear of something going wrong. But now that she’s out of Tallahassee, freedom’s so close. A heartbeat away.

The diner’s door chimes announce her arrival.

Inside, the diner’s near-empty except for a couple of men in a Naugahyde booth. Jenny’s mouth salivates as she passes a rotating stand of pies. Coconut cream, apple, pecan.

Holy shit, how long has it been since she’s had a home-cooked meal?

A sudden, vicious hunger fills her. A hunger for actual food. Not TV dinners or boxed meals or cold cereal. Delicious, greasy diner food.

“Afternoon, hon,” an elderly waitress bleats over the sizzle of the grill. She slaps a handful of menus against her meaty thigh. “Go ahead and seat yourself.”

Jenny smiles. “Thanks.”

A sigh of grateful content fills her throat. How wonderful to interact with people in the wild. Never once worrying about what Roy would want her to say or do. Never once shivering at the feel of Roy’s hand lingering on the curve of her shoulder, his fat fingers ready to dig in deep if she so much as slipped up.

Scooting into a booth behind the men, Jenny allows herself a moment to relax. From her vantage point, she can see the ocean through the window. A smile quirks her face, and she reaches for her bag, ready to take inventory of her freedom. Digging around, she tenderly cups each item she’s brought with her. When she gets to her wallet, a silver zippered pouch, she pauses. The weight in her palm—light.

Too light.

As she opens her wallet, Jenny has to stop herself from screaming. Slowly, so slowly, her trembling hand comes up to cover her mouth.

The money she saved so hard for—gone.

In its place, a note. I will always find you.

Jenny crumples it in her hand.

Despair jolts through her, causing her insides to spasm and lurch. She wants to puke. Vomit all over this table because she knows he knows. How? Tears burn her eyes. She must not have been as sneaky as she thought she was. Idiot, she tells herself. You’re an idiot.

What now? Go home? Never. She’ll never give Roy that satisfaction. She’d die first.

She’d die.

Her spirit broken, Jenny buries her face in her trembling hands.

She has nothing. She’s alone with no money, no ID, no friends, no one to turn to. All that’s waiting for her at home is her husband. Roy and his tiny, piggish eyes. Roy and his fists.

If she went home . . .

She shudders at the thought.

Oh, Jenny, oh, my Jenny, Roy would always say, cradling her face in his brutish hands. Do you know what would happen if you left? Do you know what I would do to you if you walked out?

He’d kill her.

Christ, she can’t do this anymore. The fear. The confusion. The god-awful hopelessness.

She came here today with two plans. Plan A is fucked. So fucked.

But plan B. Well, that’s not a wash. That is something she still has power over. Jenny’s glazed eyes move to the raging sea outside. As she stares at the ocean, a sudden calm overcomes her.

There’s nothing about death that’s brave. But there is something brave about trying to get out of something that isn’t working. Jenny’s already living as a dead woman. She might as well make it permanent.

“What can I get you, hon?”

The waitress’s words make her jump. Jenny’s heart pumps like a small, timid beast inside her chest.

What can I get you?The question’s a loaded gun. Jenny wants to cry, maybe laugh. Everything, she could say. A life preserver, a new brain, a goddamn miracle.

Aware the waitress is waiting for a reply, Jenny rummages through her bag. “Oh, uh . . . just coffee, please.” She finds a few meager coins left over from her bus fare and lays them on the table. She looks up at the waitress. “Do I have enough for that?” She winces at the desperation in her voice. But it’s the last thing she has left.

The waitress’s wise eyes flash with sympathy. “Of course, honey.” She shares a warm smile, then scribbles on her green notepad and moves to the next booth. Jenny bows her head and needles the hollow of her throbbing temple, knowing that the only person in the world she can trust is herself.